Emily Wilde's Compendium of Lost Tales (Emily Wilde, #3)(66)

“I must go,” he said softly, and it took a moment for the meaning to sink in.

“Damn you,” I breathed. “You would leave me behind?”

“Not by choice,” he said, taking my hand. “Never. Em—”

I yanked my hand back, too angry to allow him the satisfaction of an apology. Letting him face his stepmother alone was insupportable. Grimly, I forced my mind back to “King Macan’s Bees.” Had I not thought my way out of such impossible problems before? Had I not faced Queen Arna once already? Why could I not do so again? This was an academic riddle, and who was more skilled at untangling those than I?

Something burbled out on the lake, and a dizzying terror nearly swept me off my feet.

Wendell murmured a few words of goodbye to Orga, whom he held in his arms, instructing her not to follow us. She gave him a sleepy-eyed stare and allowed him to hand her over to Lord Taran, who looked astonished.

“Have we made peace, fell warrior?” he said. I too was surprised that Orga would allow Wendell to leave her behind so easily. The cat gave no sign she was aware of either of us, only watched Wendell inscrutably.

We said no more to Lord Taran, and clambered into the nearest boat. Well, I clambered, nearly overturning the thing; Wendell moved as gracefully as always, and easily righted us. He loosed the sails and we were off, the prow parting the silvery waters and their blurry tree shapes.

There came a yell from the dock, and I turned to see Taran staggering back, clutching his face. Blood spilled through his fingers from a row of deep gashes. And then there was a dark shape sailing over the water towards us in an impossible, gliding leap.

Orga grunted as she landed in the bow, and then she turned to lick her back, cool as anything, as if to imply that gouging Lord Taran had been merely one item on an extensive agenda.

After a startled pause, Wendell began to laugh. The sound was welcome, lightening the dread that clung to me like cold damp.





19th January, again




I’m unsure how much time has elapsed. I came back to myself just now, the pen still in my hand—I had descended into a blank haze, during which I simply stared out the window. Someone is knocking softly on my door—Callum, most likely, or Niamh. Why don’t they leave me be? I don’t wish to see anyone.

Why have no ideas come to me? I refuse to believe that all my studies, my vast knowledge of folklore, could fail me at this moment.

But I must pick up where I left off.

Wendell allowed the wind to carry us across the lake, and then he tacked south, taking us down an arm of Silverlily, which blocked the castle from view. Tree-shadow fell over us and I breathed in the smell of sedge, and then we sailed out into the open again. Dragonflies darted past and crickets murmured from sunny patches of grass, for the shadows were lengthening as the world moved towards evening. Something gurgled intermittently below the water, releasing clouds of bubbles, and occasionally it seemed that a dark shape, too large to be a fish, darted beneath the boat. Apparently the nobility were not the only ones who sailed upon Silverlily; to our left was a tiny canoe being rowed at a furious pace by a brownie in a grey cloak, and here and there along the bank I saw other miniature watercraft pulled up onshore or moored to overhanging tree limbs.

“Why have you not taken me boating before?” I said, only half in jest. The sun had come out, and with it my mood grew more optimistic. The view of the tree-lined banks was lovely, the forest darker and even more full of mysteries from this distance, and the wind was pleasantly cool against my skin. I felt as if I had come to the centre of something.

Wendell smiled. “I understood you’d taken a dislike to lakes after that field study in Sweden a few years ago.”

“That was more a dislike of water elves, as well as unscrupulous fishermen, such as those who rented me that leaky rowboat,” I said, scanning the water. “Where shall we look first? I have one or two theories.”

He gave me an anxious look. “You are not still angry with me?”

“Naturally I am,” I said, glaring. “But it is an illogical anger, for you are only trying to save your realm, and anyway I was the one who found you that bloody Macan story, thus I have as much cause to be angry at myself for thrusting you into this danger. So I have chosen to focus on the challenge at hand rather than indulge such a counterproductive sentiment.”

Wendell began to laugh. He leaned on one hand, his shoulders shaking, as the boat rocked slightly from side to side.

“Anyway,” I said, trying and failing to avoid blushing. Such a look he was giving me! “Perhaps we could start at the tip of that little peninsula and work our way out—”

“Emily,” Wendell said, perching on the seat across from me and taking my hand, “we have other business to attend to first. More important than finding my stepmother.”

I could only blink at him. “What on earth is more important than that?”

He took my hand. His eyes were greener in the dappled sunlight and emerald murk of the lake. “Will you marry me?”

I can’t think of a time when I have been more confused. I believe I stared at him for a full minute, waiting for him to explain himself. “That question has already been answered,” I said at last.

Then I realized what he meant and my pulse spiked with another surge of terror.

“Oh God,” I said. “Now? Here? With—” I waved at nothing in particular. “All this?”